State Department Labels Kurdish Group As Terrorists

The U.S. State Department said Thursday it designated the al-Qaeda Kurdish Battalions as a terrorist entity.

The group, which goes by the acronym AQKB, was established in 2007 from the remnants of other Kurdish terrorist organizations, the State Department said.

AQKB swore allegiance to al-Qaeda, as well as its Iraqi branch, and the group believes leaders of the Kurdistan Regional Government are traitors. AQKB claimed responsibility for a number of attacks against Kurdish targets in Iraq, the State Department said, including a foiled September 2010 suicide bomb attack targeting security officers in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq.

The designation, enforced by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, freezes any assets it holds under U.S. jurisdiction, and bans Americans from engaging in any transactions with the group.

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